For those of you running any rear ballast bags bigger than 750, your more than likely going to blow out the engine dividers. I started with Fly High 750's in the rear and had some serious bowing of the dividers but they never popped out. I switched to 1100's and they blow out before the bags are full.
I looked at the wake maker versions and wasn't that impressed so here's what I did.
This method is really cool because you don't need to drill any new holes in the steel framing anywhere and you can remove the reinforcements and put everything back to stock if you needed to.
1. Source some 3/4" x 3/4" x 1/8" angle steel, not aluminum! Any hardware store will carry this.
2. Cut 4 pieces at 27" each
Each piece of steel will run along each side of the center divider as shown:
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3. Take a dremel or utility knife to grind or cut a notch in the C channel at the base for each piece of steel, Only cut the front of the C channel as shown below. Do not cut through the channel entirely!
4. Test fit your steel to ensure that it sits down inside the channel tightly.
5. Test fit your center divider with both pieces of steel in place behind the divider as shown above. You may have to bend the center divider just lightly to get the steel in behind it and turn the swivel lock in place.
6. Hopefully you have made it this far with minimal difficulty. Next thing is to trim the divider that is towards the stern of the boat since we have essentially added about 1/4" more material in between the dividers with the channels. On my dividers, I had to trim 2 parts as shown below. Just remove about a 1/4", if you remove a bit more it's fine, you won't ruin anything. Test fit these dividers in with the center section. **NOTE: you will have to insert the rear dividers FIRST and then insert your center section.
7. You'll want to spray paint your steel before you do the final install to prevent rust!! (Thanks to Walter for the tip!)
8. You may have to drill a new hole in the rear divider for your mounting screw at the top.
Your all done, it should look like this: There are no sharp edges so don't worry about your bags getting popped.
